Americans mourn trailblazing Indian-American Sikh deputy

Lt Sandeep Singh Dhaliwal put the Sikh imperative of selfless service on display for all and touched a nation with his example, a senior US official has said, amid an unbridled outpouring of grief from many Americans over the gruesome killing of the first IndianAmerican police officer in Texas.

Dhaliwal, 42, who made national headlines when he was allowed to grow a beard and wear a turban on the job in the US state of Texas, was gunned down while conducting a mid-day traffic stop in northwest of Houston on Friday.

Family, friends and strangers prayed on Saturday at Dhaliwal's memorial off Willancy Lane in northwest Harris County.

Dhaliwal's youngest sister Ranjeet Kaur joined the crowd and lit a candle for her brother. She remembered a man who loved his job.

"He was a really great person. He didn't deserve all this. He was a great person. He helped everybody. He never said no. He does as much as he can. I think this was the wrong time and the wrong place," Kaur was quoted as saying by an US news channel.

Reacting to Dhaliwal's killing, US acting assistant secretary for South and Central Asia Alice Wells said, "We mourn alongside colleagues, friends and family of Lt Sandeep Singh Dhaliwal, 1st Indian-American in Texas to serve as a police officer while maintaining articles of faith.

"Dhaliwal put the Sikh imperative of selfless service on display for all & touched a nation with his example," she tweeted.

A 10-year veteran of the Harris County Sheriff's office and its first Sikh deputy, Dhaliwal was taken by helicopter to a hospital where he died, a decade after becoming the force's first Sikh and pushing for a historic expansion of religious rights in the department.

"Sandeep was a trailblazer for the Sikh-American community. He served not just the Sikh community here in Houston with honour and dignity, but all of his community," Bobby Singh, south-east regional director for the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund said on Twitter.